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Old Nov 26, 2014, 03:58 AM
ParisMama ParisMama is offline
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Member Since: Nov 2014
Location: Paris, France
Posts: 7
Quote:
Originally Posted by mountain human View Post
Going to a 12 step meeting tonight, gym first. I keep telling myself that I'm going to meditate daily, not yet. My goal is to meditate 15 minutes or so before bed, this might help with my insomnia. I've been trying the guided Buddhist meditations on YouTube, since my brain is to "busy" to meditate on my own. I hope with some regular practice I can meditate more easily.
I've been reading a lot about habit change (actually a favorite topic for years now, despite limited progress!) and one things that I've seen & experimented with is to make the desired habit easier and easier until you can actually do it. So instead of 15 minutes, maybe it's 5 minutes, or even just 1. Or just opening youtube at all..

Another thing that's worked for me regarding meditation is learning a very simple breath-counting meditation (I usually just count to 3 over & over) that I can do anywhere, with no gadgets. But I also love audio guided meditation on my phone - the app I loved has changed to a rather-expensive paid one so I can't recommend it, I've downloaded a few new ones to try but no experience yet - but if you have a smartphone that's another idea.

In the end, I've found the best way for me to meditate semi-regularly is to have it be what I do before I fall asleep, lying in bed... I know from my own experience that a separate, ideally morning, meditation time is best, but the bedtime thing works best for me to develop the habit and it always makes me fall deeply asleep quickly.

Are there ways you could look at making your 15 minute daily meditation become a longer-term goal, and find smaller steps to implement now?
Thanks for this!
Blue_Bird, Just keep swimming, SeekerOfLife